Page 80 of This Monster of Mine

“Damn you,” she spat, pressing the heels of her hands into her eyes. In the distance, the citadel housing the Academiae rose high, Aoran Tower a dark cudgel in the west. “You manipulative, violent bastard.”

She didn’t know how long she stood there, hunched over, until approaching voices made her retreat to where she’d tied Caelum.

The Tetrarchy approached the tavern in full regalia. Cassandane smiled weakly at something Tullus said, the deep shadows under her eyes saying that she’d prefer to be anywhere else. Aelius inclined his head graciously at passersby and took a few hands when people sidled up to greet him. And therehewas at the back of the group. The Tetrarchy’s black sheep. The statues of former monarchs on Edessa’s city walls showed more expression.

A deep, slow-burning anger burgeoned until it eroded her numbness. She yearned to plow her fist into his face until that aristocratic nose shattered. But there were better ways to hurt him. Mounting Caelum, she dug in her heels and sped off. Steps from the front gates of Aoran Tower, she dismounted, breathing hard.

Think.Look at the facts. Kadra had known she was alive when he’d ordered for her to be given a new face. Why had Othus lied to him about her death?

Because he knew Kadra did it. She laughed bitterly. To spare him jail, he’d destroyed the records and turned her into a dead prostitute, rather than have his homicidal foster son learn of her survival. He’d most likely bribed the healers and vigiles into leaving and keeping her survival a secret. An edict they’d all have kept after he and his Petitor had died. And as for Martinus, who seemed incorruptible and obedient to his Tetrarch, Othus had simply ruined his career. And she’d passed into legend.

Then why would Kadra kill Othus and his Petitor despite those efforts?

She didn’t care. He’d ruined her life. She’d destroy his. Sarai stared at Aoran Tower, trying to find the strength to storm in and ransack it. Bile hit her tongue again as the smooth fabric of Kadra’s robes slid across her skin. Undoing the buttons, she threw them on the ground and pulled out her key.

“Petitor Sarai.” A figure detached itself from the shadows on the cobblestone path. She brandished the key in front of her, a poor weapon.

Gaius raised his hands in surrender. “I apologize for intruding.” He sighed. “This is the last thing Tetrarch Kadra would want, but I can’t sit by. Do you really believe that he’s behind the Petitor deaths? Does what you’ve seen of him match with that?”

Fear spiked fast. “Were you listening to Martinus and me? Have you been following me?”

“Not intentionally, alright? I heard Othus’s name and figured you were asking about the rumors. And you’re clearly upset so—”

“Why are you watching me?”

He looked uncomfortable. “Tetrarch Kadra’s orders, but it’s to keep you safe!” he added hurriedly when her hands formed fists. “Helvus has you in his sights. Half the men in that tavern were Metals Guildsmen, and you were isolated. If you die—”

“Kadra gets blamed,” she finished. “You want to know what sort of man I’ve seen? I—” She swallowed, close to tears.

You’ve always been strong, Cisuré had once said ruefully.Perhaps too strong. But that wasn’t true. She wasn’t strong so much as capable of numbing herself to the worst and watching every blow land with wry fatalism. She’d buried the parts of herself that hurt and raged, turning wary and self-contained. It had worked for years. Untilhim.

She’d disliked him, even while reluctantly admiring his knifelike mind, tightly leashed control, and the way his every movement was imbued with the unconscious grace of a man accustomed to violence. Part of her had taken quiet pride in the moments he called herhisPetitor, in their silent agreement on the law’s malevolence. And now she only had herself to blame for having fallen too deep.

“I can’t tell how much of him is real and how much is a facade that’s duped everyone into fawning over him,” she bit out, on the outermost edge of her restraint.

“Has he ever sought out public goodwill?” Gaius demanded. “I’ve worked with him since he was a fledgling iudex, mind like a steel trap even then. But I’ve never seen him do something purely because it would make someone like him. Have you?”

Stricken, she halted. She’d associated goodwill with his actions because it had drawn her to him. But killing the Guildsmen guarding the debt-slaves instead of jailing them, covering up her Probing of Helvus, none of that would look good for him if it came to light.

“He’s one man, Petitor Sarai. He has the sharpest mind I’ll ever have the privilege to know, but he is just one man. Why do you keep acting like he’s Deceit himself?”

Because if he were simply a man of preternatural cunning and not an evil manipulator, then she would have no shield againsteverythingshe felt for him. If she allowed herself to trust in his potential innocence in the Fall and she ended up being wrong, it would destroy her.

Whatever was on her face made Gaius hurriedly take a step back and apologize for upsetting her further. After he left, she walked along the path, trying to set her head to rights. A splash of scarlet caught her attention. A statue stood at the edge of the path. She drew closer and paused in awe.

Madness etched into marble, Lord Wrath rose before her, sword aloft and pointed at an unseen enemy. Fury twisted his features into a snarl. His burnished armor shone in the moonlight, a crimson swath staining his shield.

There wasn’t a more fitting guardian for Aoran Tower. Reviled and revered, Wrath held a controversial position in the High Elsar. Most saw no use for the god’s favor in a civilized world. Of course, those people rarely saw how thin the veneer of civilization was. She felt a strange kinship with that otherworldly face. In the silence between midnight and dawn wheretruth yearned to leap off the tongue, she knelt before the statue, desperate for a confidant.

“Help me,” Sarai whispered. “I … care for a monster. I haven’t condemned him when I know that the Tetrarchy is desperate for a chink in his armor. I don’t even know if my memories can be trusted”—her voice cracked—“or if I’m so angry that I’ve twisted everything.”

His mad eyes seemed to ask if there was anything wrong with anger.

“Most would say that there is. It swallows you whole if you stare too long at it.”

Righter of Wrongs.The thought abruptly entered her mind. One of Wrath’s oldest titles, it stemmed from a tale in the Codices that posited him as once being Lord Justice. Having given humanity laws to aid them in serving each other, he’d grown bitter and disillusioned when they used them to fashion wars and approve atrocities. After tens of millennia, Justice had gone mad, birthing Wrath. Only one of his former appellations remained. Righter of Wrongs. Where Justice had failed, Wrath would rectify what the law lacked courage to do.

Anger but with courage and restraint. The words slid into her head. She took an unsteady breath, tears rolling down her cheeks. The gods had never spoken to her. Not the grand ways they apparently did to clerics. But as she bowed low before the god of anger, quiet erasing her turmoil, she thought that perhaps they hadn’t forsaken her entirely.

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